Over decades, Pilger exposed imperialist wars and intrigues, defended democratic rights and was unerring in his hostility to reporters who functioned as stenographers of governments.
…a film by that incisive, principled and intelligent film maker John Pilger is being shown on-line at Sands Films this Tuesday. The screening is for the Julian Assange Defence Committee. The PR by-line for Bush and the quisling Blair’s illegal attack on Iraq was Shock and Awe: so be prepared to be shocked by how PR manipulates public opinion when the elites want to go to war. Be awed by the father of PR, an American, Edward Bernaise, who taught governments how to give symbols meaning at the expense of facts. Learn about how embedding journalists in the military during the Iraq war forced an unholy alliance between government and press. That twenty-four hour news is a vast echo chamber. How the build up to the war required journalists to be ‘patriotic’ and ignore the facts and their own unease, lest heads roll – metaphorically speaking. That 90% of all deaths in Iraq were of civilians. That people at a wedding in Afghanistan are picked up as ‘heat signatures�